Level Three Trust Maybe you’ve seen the movie, you know, the one where one person is looking for the key to their happiness only to find that it was right in front of them the whole time? I’m not naming the movie because there are countless stories with this theme. Sometimes the best relationships are…

Stop Hitting the Brakes It was cold at the top of the volcano which, I was told, is true of every morning at daybreak. We were mounted on bicycles riding down the winding roads adorning the Haleakala, a large volcano on the beautiful island of Maui. We had begun our descent at 6:00AM and it…

Invisible Necessities There is a stretch of highway that I love to drive. The mountains are on one side and a skyline on the other. The drive between Seattle and Olympia Washington can be a beautiful drive. But not on this day. I saw was appeared to me to be extreme fog. But the more…

The Difference a Turn Makes It was quite a few years ago now but I remember it clearly. I remember because I was scared that I was going to die. Driving through the neighborhoods on an icy winter day, I neared an intersection ready to turn right. My brain was in neutral as I subconsciously hit…

Traveling Alone Have you ever taken a vacation by yourself? A good friend of mine who lives in the northern section of the U.S. has found a new way to deal with the arctic feel of winter. As an avid golfer, he has decided to take two or three days each month in January, February,…

Become a Destination Expert Ever wonder how you got to where you are? Sometimes that is a harmless question. Many of us have driven our car somewhere and have put the “cognitive automatic pilot” on. We don’t really remember the drive. It just happened. Seemingly arbitrary decisions were made along the way. If the path…

Building Momentum It wasn’t supposed to rain. At least that was what my weather app told me. It had started out as a beautiful day with temperatures in the mid 60’s rising up to a gorgeous 82 degrees. Perfect. Until it wasn’t. In a matter of minutes everything changed. First the wind seemed to change…

You Assess, You Win We meant to take action, but the opportunity passed us by. OR We didn’t realize that staff person was not doing what we thought they were. OR The numbers we thought were right, were actually padded to look better than they are. OR A leader we believed was on board just…

You might be a strategic leader if… Last week we discussed the importance of avoiding strategic mishaps, and why they occur. This week we continue our discussion with more specifics on how to be a strategic leader. Jeff Foxworthy is a famous comedian who originally became known for his one-liners dealing with – what he…

Avoiding Strategic Mishaps We evaluated. We dreamt. We planned. We implemented the plan. (Or so we thought.) But… we didn’t mean for it to turn out this way. Sound familiar? At its simplest, strategy can be defined as crafting a plan for how we will succeed. Unfortunately, simply crafting a plan for how we will…